Posted on 09/18/2008 4:20:05 PM PDT by SeekAndFind
Gold! (well, that’s what all the commercials on FNC and talk radio tell me)
Fertile land and guns.
About three years ago I spoke with a friend who deals in antique guns at gunshows. He’s retired from the military and also from a stint with law enforcement so he has a decent retirement income which he has invested in a variety of places. At that time though, he claimed that his guns were making more money than all the rest of his investments.
Since then I’ve watched the values of various guns. Unlike stocks and bonds or T-bills, they’ve all maintained or exceeded their values at the time I started watching.
Now I know that everybody doesn’t have a vault or hardened storage room for a bunch of wood and steel, so guns might not be the best investment for them. Anything tangible though, will be safe. Be it guns or old cars or real estate or just gold and silver coins, as long as it can be touched and passed on to someone else it will maintain its value.
In the past few weeks precious metals have dropped in price. To assume they’ll stay at the low they’ve reached or even drop much lower isn’t reasonable in my opinion. Value is established by a number of factors but most notably by scarcity. Old cars are valuable because most of them have been melted down. Real estate is valuable because very little of it is being made anymore. Guns are valuable because government is always trying to keep them away from the citizens and precious metals are precious because they are scarce. Until the supply of any of those things is increased beyond the demand they will retain their value.
Notice that I said “retain.” While some things may actually increase in value, thus showing a profit on an investment, others may only hold their value relative to the dollar. Those should be considered as safeguards against total financial meltdown. If things get so bad no one wants your ‘53 Buick or can pay for it if they did want it it’ll just sit in storage and you won’t be able to buy beans with the money you didn’t get for it. On the other hand, you might be able to trade a couple of Silver Eagles for food or medicine. Even if the prices for necessities are inflated you’ll still need them - unlike the Buick.
I love Stienhardts book. It has a great lesson. When you don’t have a clue as to what is going on just go to cash. That said there have been a couple of great trades lately. Great.
Come on folks—think. The prudent things to do right now are: 1. Leave your investments alone. Most or all of them, up $500,000 or whatever, are protected. But most of all you do not lose money if you do not sell stocks for less than you paid. The market ultimately will fix itself—albeit with some loan money from taxpayers. 2. If you have some spare bucks around, this is a good time to buy some really good stocks at bargain prices. This is called opportunity.
Gold and Euros. Are there gold euros? ;-)
Seriously.
It appears to me the Fed is well rehearsed in how to manage every stage of this crisis. It’s like these guys are finally in the sh$t and they are loving it. Lifelong economic commandos, they finally get to see some action.
Seriously, they had this FTC styled bailout available all along. It was only after there was sufficient pain felt in the form of companies being taken out and shot that they felt like we had suffered enough. People lost jobs by the truckload in Manhattan but it kind of feels contrived. And now with this new mega bank ready to foreclose on these real estate deals, well clean up and move on. Kind of like a financial hurricane. But the Fed can seed the clouds and seemingly break it up at any time.
What’s Safe Now ? ( Where to Put Your Money in These Uncertain Times )
[They’ve really got me nervous. I just laid down a wad of cash to get a small fortune out of Nigeria and I don’t want to put it in a bank that can’t be trusted. What should I do? ]
I say relax. You have one of the better investments out there.
Or you can invest in my must hit business plan to sell one (just one) stick of bubblegum to every Chinaman. Think of the volume!
Mattresses have been the bank of choice for over 1,000 years.
Just remember to withdraw your funds prior to donating your bank to the Salvation Army.
Nigeria? Really? You're not one of those deposed Nigerian leaders who suddenly has a need to stash about $21 million into my bank account are you? If so .. just send out lots and lots of emails 'til you get a hit!
I was trying to think of something clever like that.
I invested in silver. Silver wrapped Hershey Kisses. Unfortunately, I seem to have eaten my nest egg.
Gold is still over 10% down from it’s highs.
On the other hand, it’s almost 10% up from it’s value in 1981.
A complete collection of baseball trading cards from 1981 appreciated much better than gold.
How about placing your money in farmland partnerships? I understand there is a pretty good ROE, but it is definitely a long term investment.
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